Climate Commitment: WellSpan Launches Sustainability Strategy

CEO Roxanna Gapstur, PhD, RN, shares details about the health system's new "Path to 2030" initiative, which includes a commitment to cut greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030.

WellSpan Health, a nonprofit health system that serves south central Pennsylvania and northern Maryland, has made a commitment to create a greener future for its communities.

Last month, the health system announced it has created a new sustainability strategy called "Path to 2030." With buy-in from the organization's top leaders down to its workforce, the strategy includes multiple industry pledges and actionable steps to take toward WellSpan's commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by 2030.

In an interview with HealthLeaders, WellSpan President and CEO Roxanna Gapstur, PhD, RN, shares details about the organization's sustainability strategy, which includes diversifying its supply chain, creating sustainable clinical operations, and reducing water, waste, and chemical use.

This transcript has been edited for clarity and brevity.

HealthLeaders: What impact does healthcare have on the environment?

Roxanna Gapstur: According to Practice Greenhealth, which is one of the collaborators we use for our program, our industry creates more than 30 pounds of waste per hospital bed per day.

Eight-and-a-half percent of national greenhouse gas emissions are from healthcare and amount to about $8.3 billion in industry and energy costs.

We tend to also be the highest users of water in our communities as well, especially with hospital care.

HL: Where did the idea for WellSpan's "Path to 2030" sustainability strategy come from?

Gapstur: We all know that environmental factors create additional health threats to our communities. In fact, there have been some estimates that up to 25% of disease burdens and chronic health conditions are impacted by climate change and pollution. There's a great reason for health systems, in general, to want to contribute to having healthier communities, and also contribute to a healthier Earth and climate for all of us, because all of us have that mission.

For us, what that means is a passion for how we can be part of the improvement. We've signed on to two significant industry pledges. The first was the US Department of Health and Human Services Health Care Sector Climate Pledge, and the second is the Healthcare Without Harm climate pledge from the World Health Organization.

We've committed as an organization to reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by 2030 and we'd like to be carbon neutral by 2050. That's a stake in the sand that our board of directors and senior leadership team have made, and it's something that our employees have appreciated.

As an organization that is committed to health equity, we feel it's also really important because as we know, often vulnerable populations take the brunt of climate change inclusion because of the areas where they live.

HL: What are the main aspects of WellSpan's "Path of 2030" sustainability strategy and how does the health system plan on addressing these?

Gapstur: We have three areas of focus.

1. The diversity of our supply chain.

We all know that the supply chain has been disrupted through COVID and one of the things we learned as an organization, and perhaps as an industry, was to have more flexibility in our supply chain. We also take seriously the fact that we're generally the largest employer and we have a large economic impact in our counties across south central Pennsylvania, so diversifying our supply chain is a good thing to do for many reasons, including our sustainability strategy.

We're increasing our reliance on local suppliers, including partnering with local food suppliers, like Bell & Evans' in Lebanon County and Wayne Nell & Sons Meats in Adams County. We'll be purchasing a lot more of our meat, dairy, and produce from local suppliers, which cuts down on transportation time; all of those things that contribute to the environment. It also has the secondary impact of improving the economy in our area because we're reinvesting dollars in our area.

2. Sustainability and clinical operations.

We've had a lot of work going on already at WellSpan Good Samaritan Hospital in Lebanon, where we've taken our first steps with receiving a Practice Greenhealth 2022 partner Recognition Award. We received that because we have reduced medical waste by using centralized bins and reusable sharps containers, and we've been conserving resources in the operating room there and that accounts for about 30% of our hospital waste.

We're moving to reusable hard cases for our surgical kits, we're replacing disposable containers with a fluid management system, and we're reviewing kits annually to eliminate unnecessary supplies. We're also using reprocessing and addressing the carbon footprint of anesthesia gas, and recycling clinical plastics.

Last year, we avoided 112,000 pounds of waste to landfill through clinical device reprocessing alone. It's exciting for us to have that kind of impact so soon in our sustainability journey.

3. Reducing energy and water consumption.

We're going to be introducing hybrid vehicles into our fleet, which means we'll need more charging stations, and we'll also be installing our first charging stations across south central Pennsylvania, and we're expanding that program now.

We're also evaluating plans to expand solar energy. What a lot of people don't know in south central Pennsylvania is that we have a solar farm on our WellSpan Philhaven campus in Mount Gretna. We're going to start to leverage more green energy from there.

We're improving some inefficiencies in our courier service and announcing some specific goals for water waste and chemical use reductions. Those will be good things for our communities, but also for our employees who may be using certain chemicals.

HL: What financial investments have you or will you make for this?

Gapstur: Our CFO has been a member of the project team and this work is borne out of the area that she leads. She's been part of the strategy right from the beginning and is very supportive of the long-term investments that we need to make to improve the climate and improve the health of the community. It's nice to have our CFO on board and our finance committee, knowing that in the short term we may need to spend a little bit more money on certain things in order to get that long-term benefits.

One example of that is we are building a new critical care and surgical tower at our flagship hospital to modernize that whole facility. With that, it is going to become the very first healthcare facility in south central Pennsylvania that is LEED Gold Certified, and that did involve a little bit of extra investment, but we think because that tower is going to be here for many years to come, that it's the right thing to do for the environment and for our teams. There will also be dedicated green space on that campus in a sustainable and energy-efficient design that will promote a great environment for the patients and will have less impact on the community around us.

HL: What advice do you have for other hospitals and health systems on addressing environmental issues?

Gapstur: Consider how sustainability and this kind of work fits into your strategy as an organization. As healthcare organizations, I would also recommend considering how it impacts your vulnerable populations and your health equity strategy as well.

Engaging the board and the senior team is a good thing to do at the beginning of thinking about something like this because it creates a burning platform and a foundation for the work going forward.